Cast yourself (you are the spell)

Chapter 20

"What the hell was that about?" Hope hisses, sitting across from Sebastian on the common room couch.

Professor Slughorn had walked into the fight a second later and had handed half of them detention slips, threatening suspension to the other half. He had then asked Josette and Rafael to take Milton to the hospital wing to fix his unusually bent nose and his probable concussion, leaving the rest of the Slytherins to sit there for another half an hour. Hope did not know why he needed both Rafael and Josette to escort him, or why the idiotic boy couldn't just go by himself.

"Did you have to hit him? I mean, are you a wizard or not?" Maya adds, practically seething because she had received another day of detention even though she hadn't done anything. Sebastian crosses his arms childishly.

"He wronged me," he declares, glaring at the floor. Hope rolls her eyes.

"He barely looked at you, Pyre," she tells him.

"Well, he was thinking of wronging me!" he insists dramatically, his accent thick to the point where they all could barely understand him.

"C'mon, mate, let's just get you to bed." Ethan clads a hand on his shoulder and the two of them walk upstairs to the dorms, leaving the girls behind to gossip.

"Did I really miss so much?" Rose groans.

"Let me just say," Maya leans in, her eyes sparkling, "he kicked that Gryffindor's ass."

"Damn!" Rose looks upset that she didn't see it herself. "Can you guys reenact it or something? I've been doing nothing but homework the entire night."

"Yeah, sure," Maya agrees, standing up. "Get up, Pen."

Penelope huffs and swings her leg over the couch she's laying on.

"Okay, I'll be Seb," Maya says, clearing her throat and pounding her fist into her palm as she tries to get into character.

"Why do I have to be the blood traitor?" Penelope whines, and Hope chuckles darkly.

"Okay, so first he punched him like this-"

"No," Hope interrupts. They look at her, expecting their fun will about to be ruined. "First he tackled him, remember?"

"Oh, right!" Maya says, resuming. "Okay, so first he threw Greasley onto the floor-"

The common room door swings open, and Josette Saltzman herself comes walking in quickly but Maya and Penelope don't stop talking.

She pauses, looks at them, and Hope sees the exact moment she realizes what they're doing. She shakes her head with disbelief and swiftly rises up the stairs.

Hope becomes irritated with herself for falling back into old, disgusting habits. She watches the muggleborn until she disappears back into the hallway, and when she looks back to her friends, Rose is staring at her with furrowed eyebrows and curious eyes.

Penelope and Maya don't realize that Rose has stopped paying attention yet, and Hope hastily turns away. She murmurs something about going to bed as well before she leaves, too.

-

The Gryffindors strike back in the morning for the prank war, but Hope does not immediately notice anything wrong. She eats breakfast and talks to her friends like normal, and then goes to her regular Potions class.

As per usual, she comes in a half-second before the bell rings, and sits down without glancing once at Josette, despite desperately wanting to. Today, the tables are set up in groups of four, so Hope knows that they'll be having a competition of some sort.